Competitive spirit drives Jindal's top gun

BATON ROUGE -- The first thing to remember about Timmy Teepell, Gov.-elect Bobby Jindal's 32-year-old transition leader and soon-to-be chief of staff, is that he can be a bit driven.

How driven?

As a basketball-obsessed adolescent growing up in Baton Rouge, Teepell often would get up at 5 a.m. to practice the moves of Louisiana State University hoops legend "Pistol" Pete Maravich. Working from a set of instructional videos that Maravich had produced, Teepell would drill relentlessly on passing, dribbling and shooting until it was time to go inside and study.

Timmy Teepell

"I'm very competitive. If you're going to do something, you win," Teepell said.

Another thing to remember is that even though Teepell is a product of home schooling who never went to college and is far younger than most people in his position, he is hardly a political novice.

In one form or another, he has been preparing for his new job ever since volunteering for his first state legislative race at the age of 15. He has spent the better part of two decades as a foot soldier for conservative Christian causes, raising money, formulating strategy and managing campaigns, culminating with Jindal's historic, 37-point win on Oct. 20.

Hearing Teepell tell it, winning a gubernatorial race is not so different from mastering a jump shot. All it takes is a little persistence.

"It's not rocket science," Teepell said. "To win a campaign you have to get a lot of people engaged in supporting you. Not just voters, but when you have somebody who's willing to go door-to-door in their own neighborhood telling their neighbors, asking people to vote for you. That's powerful."

As he spoke, the sound of drills and hammers provided background noise on the 12th floor of the LSU dorm that will serve as transition headquarters for the new administration. It is here where Teepell and his small staff will spend the next 11 weeks helping Jindal put together the team that will take over state government on Jan. 14.

But none of the appointments that Jindal makes is likely to be as important as that of Teepell, who has become Jindal's most trusted political adviser since the two began working together shortly after Jindal lost his first race for governor in 2003.

Faith and ideology

What might have initially seemed like an awkward pairing -- Jindal the wonkish Rhodes Scholar in khakis and penny loafers, Teepell the lanky "road scholar" in jeans and cowboy boots -- has ended up working to both men's advantage.

After managing Jindal's landslide congressional victories in 2004 and 2006, Teepell orchestrated a gubernatorial campaign that managed to raise more than $11 million from more than 19,000 individual donors and made Jindal the first candidate to win an open gubernatorial seat in a primary since Louisiana adopted its all-party system in 1975. Buddy Roemer was elected in 1987 when incumbent Edwin Edwards dropped out of the runoff.

Cosmetic differences aside, Jindal and Teepell share in common a deep Christian faith, conservative ideology and keen political instincts.

"What I admire about him is he's a very smart man who also doesn't mind rolling up his sleeves and going to work," Jindal said, recalling the day of his first election to Congress when Teepell volunteered to shake hands during a 4 a.m. factory shift change.

"He's got a great strategic mind, sees the big picture, but also is great at execution," Jindal said.

Born in Baton Rouge to a salesman for Lamar Advertising and a homemaker, Teepell is the second oldest of four boys -- Tommy, Timmy, Taylor and Todd -- whose parents decided when Timmy was just starting high school that it was time to home-school the children.

At the time, Tommy Teepell Sr. was spending much of his time traveling, and today he describes it as a turning point for the family. "Our family, between sports and school, we were kind of falling apart," the elder Teepell recalled. "We just decided we were going to circle the wagons. So we brought them home."

First taste of politics

It was home-schooling that gave Teepell his first taste of political activism, courtesy of his mother, Brenda.

Anytime a bill would come up at the state Legislature that affected home-schoolers, Brenda Teepell would show up at the Capitol as an unpaid lobbyist to buttonhole lawmakers, occasionally with her children in tow.

"She would just spend hours down there," said Johnny Koch, a Baton Rouge lawyer and lobbyist who has known the Teepell family since before Timmy was born.

Teepell said his first stab at politics came when he volunteered for a legislative candidate. And he credits his mother for the initial push. "I kind of fell into it," he said. "My mom said, 'He's a good guy. He needs help.'$?"

A couple of years later, Teepell recalled, he and his family were at a national conference for home-schoolers when he was introduced to Michael Farris, an influential Christian conservative who is one of the fathers of the home-school movement. Farris, who would go on to found the nation's first four-year college designed specifically for Christian home-schoolers, Patrick Henry College, was putting together a lobbying organization and asked Teepell to help.

At the age of 18, when his peers were attending college, Teepell moved to suburban Washington, D.C., to work for Farris, learning the art of grassroots fundraising and organizing.

His hard work earned quick promotions, and by his early 20s he had taken charge of the Madison Project, a political action committee founded by Farris that funneled money to Christian conservatives.

In his spare time, he gained campaign experience working for legislative candidates in Virginia.

Daunting task ahead

"There's no doubt that he emerged from part of the conservative movement that is much more grassroots-oriented than other parts" of the GOP, Farris said. "Timmy rose through groups that are used to raising $10 and $20 and $50 and $100 rather than $1,000. That was his first introduction to politics."

Teepell's work at the Madison Project led to a stint at the Republican National Committee, where he served as deputy political director, until he signed on with Jindal just as he was gearing up to run for Congress in 2004.

The lessons he had learned as a shoestring organizer paid off. Rather than discussing the campaign's issues or strategies, Teepell appears most proud of the grassroots support he was able to generate. He said Jindal's campaign volunteers knocked on more than 2.4 million doors in the months leading up to the Oct. 20 primary, including 750,000 in the final week.

Now he faces what may be a more daunting task: bringing the grassroots skills he learned to bear on a Capitol environment that historically eschews political partisanship.

Teepell said that culture in Baton Rouge was one of the big attractions to coming home.

"There are relationships you build in Louisiana where people put aside their partisanship and see people for who they are and build those relationships," Teepell said. "That's something that being in D.C. I always missed about Louisiana and .$?.$?. it's one of the reasons I wanted to come back."

Jeff Brooks, a lawyer and lobbyist with the Adams & Reese law firm in Washington, D.C., expects Teepell to make a smooth transition from the campaign trail to the more complex task of putting glossy, 25-point policy papers into action.

"He understands the connection between how to get elected and governing, and I think that's why (Jindal) put him in that spot," Brooks said. "He's as shrewd as they come politically."

'I did the best I could'

Teepell, who is married with six children, said he never really planned on a career in politics, though it's a subject that held his interest from an early age.

Two decades after setting his sights on becoming the next Pistol Pete, Teepell still carries the gangling build of a three-point shooter. Where Jindal comes off somewhat like the earnest "A" student, Teepell carries himself more with the easygoing style of a former athlete.

But for someone driven enough to shoot baskets at sunrise, he talks about his political rise as something of an accident. Politics was a career he fell into.

"Since I never went to college, it's not like I ever sat down and decided on a career decision," Teepell said. "I just did the best I could wherever I was, and that led to something else. Twelve years later, wow, I'm still in it. It was never a conscious career choice."

Jan Moller can be reached at jmoller@timespicayune.com or (225) 342-5207.